Monthly Archives: April 2013

I love my life right now. My child is healthy, happy and full of smiles. I am fully engaged in my work. I am meeting great people every day. I am incredibly positive about the future. But every now and then something ugly from my past tries to creep in and pull my quintessential happy rug out from underneath me. I had to note how I respond to this. I want to remain in a happy place.

I think we have two options in life when it comes to our overall outlook on things; it’s pretty plain and simple. We can live in the past stuck in the present stagnant or we can be in the present with our eyes wide to the future. The main difference, is basically are we living with regret of our life choices, or are we living actively making choices for our future. The proverbial cliché comes to mind of the glass being half full or half empty, but I say a better analogy is better stated are we filling up our cups or just emptying them.

Life filled with optimism and hope, means that we continually filling up our lives or ‘cups’ with all kinds of good. This kind of overall mental well-being acts like a pump primer for more good things. Simply being grateful for what you have and dedicated on what your moving towards naturally is going to attract more positive interactions with friends and family, people at work, and in the areas of your life that have other social aspects. The more good you put out essentially means the more good you attract your way.

Life filled over analyzing the past, picking apart every detail of a tragedy or down turn in life essentially is emptying the cup. The amount of energy that being negative and thinking negatively it takes is unbelievable and this behavior causes a serious physical, emotion and spiritual drain, literally and figuratively. Mental anguish is exhausting entirely. It’s just a drain on our limited resources to be a social and productive member of our work places, families and communities.

I have not always been sunny side up. I have had my share of dark times. I look back in my life at look at the times that I was abandoned by my parents, let down by people who were supposed to care for me, bullied by my peers, not making a team, not landing that job, not accelerating in a work place, and it all makes me exactly who I am. Perfectly equipped with all of the experience necessary to not repeat my failures and not completely empathy my cup festering over the things in life that don’t go my way.

Instead I look at the disappointments life deals me and I feel a sense of peace knowing that every moment brings me closer to being the person I am meant to be, to do the things I am meant to do. I am not entirely sure of what that looks like, however I am fully grateful that the more that I make great choices, and the more happy I am on the inside with all that I have (namely being what I need right now) the more opportunities I create for myself. It’s like a turbine of inner positive motivation, simply propelling me forward.

Filling the cup, so that you can drink from it as often as you need is difficult. Being positive and eager in uncertainty is a inner battle. It’s human nature to want to anticipate surprises and anticipate risks. It’s actually inherent to survival of our species. It is so much easier to let the cup drain. This is why a lot of us are walking around stuck in the past, stuck in a moment, stuck with a bad attitude or a dismal outlook. But if you put in the hard work and make a mental note to practice gratitude, self-evaluation, moments of joy, moments of laughter, and moments of happiness, the overall sense of inner quiet and inner peace and true joy creates more of this in your life, happiness brings abundance in all of the things that you need.

My pathways to avoiding being an emptier of my cup and seriously loving my life a lot more inlcude;